Bislig City Takes New Steps In Journey Towards Organic Agriculture, By Joining Asian Local Governments for Organic Agriculture and International Federation of Organic Agriculture Movement in Asia
Industry: Environment
Surgiao Del Sur, Philippines (PRUnderground) October 30th, 2020
Bislig City is taking its newest steps on its journey towards organic agriculture, by joining the Asian Local Governments for Organic Agriculture (ALGOA) and the International Federation of Organic Agriculture Movement in Asia.
Vice Governor Librado Navarro is driving this initiative. When he assumed office as the City Mayor of Bislig, he articulated a vision for the city to shift from its reliance on the logging and paper industry to agri-business and tourism.
Navarro attended the 2016 ALGOA Organic Foundation Course in South Korea. Subsequent to that, Bislig City hosted the 3rd Organic Asia Congress for IFOAM Asia in 2018, attended by 85 foreign delegates and 700 local delegates across the region. The Congress recognized COAFC as the Organic Education and Social Innovations Institute of IFOAM Asia (OESII).
“Our goal is to become the model city for organic agriculture in the Philippines,” Navarro says, “This is providing opportunities to farmers, and we have already trained more than 2,300 farmers, who have now fully adopted organic agriculture.”
The city has also established the Bislig City Organic Consolidated and Marketing Cooperative, through which the farmers earn premium incentives. The city has, in addition, offered full scholarships to senior high school students taking up organic agriculture.
Agriculture had once been the primary industry in Bislig City. When logging emerged on the scene, farmers flocked to the world of timber, pulp and paper mills. However, logging encountered a slump and ultimately shut down, displacing thousands of workers, heavily impacting the economy, and increasing poverty rates.
City officials made the decision to not return to traditional agriculture due to skyrocketing prices of farm inputs, extensive damage from chemicals and fertilizers, and destruction of biodiversity and the environment. These are the reasons supporting Bislig City’s current adoption of organic agriculture.
